A Hip-Hop Rejoinder

I did not expect everyone to agree with my opinion however an anonymous writer from Digital Pretenders attempted to critique me by completely misunderstanding everything I said.

This isn’t an Old vs New Debate

Ah the age old criticism. That this new age (insert generation here) is listening to shitty music! The truth is that the youngings [ sic ] are listening to more music now than ever. Streaming websites have allowed a bigger variety of music to enter our newest generations ears and to be enjoyed by so many

There have always been niche hip-hop artists e.g., Insane Clown Possy. However if you were to ask the average fan what they think of when they hear “rap” or “hip-hop.” They seldom mention them.

That’s because why they’re music maybe hip-hop, but they aren’t. They’ve never been part of the mainstream or have any impact on it.

You can point to all these very unique hidden rappers in the depths of SoundCloud but they’re not the ones topping the charts.

As evidenced by the highest selling hip hop album of the year being a [ sic ] album by Kendrick Lamar, someone who no one would dare call ignorant rap or “mumble rap”.

It’s funny the author points to Kendrick Lamar as a reason why hip-hop is still doing good. It shows he didn’t even read the end of my article. To quote myself:

It’s easy to point out all these rappers and say hip-hop is degrading more and more but this overlooks all the very talented artists to come out in recent years.

Among them are Kendrick Lamar, Wale, Chance the Rapper, and Big Sean. And most of them have been more successful than these mumble rappers.

Trap ishedonistic

This part of the article is a complete straw-man. I never said “trap was hedonistic.” Neither did I say that rap wasn’t hedonistic.

What I said was that these new rappers lack creativity to talk about other subject-matter besides hedonism. Again, quoting myself:

Lack of creativity outsideof hedonistic content

This doesn’t mean that they shouldn’t have some care-free, party-up music songs. (The last thing I want is a bunch of Recovery albums). Only that they can’t seem to go beyond that.

All of the artists that the author mentions, Tribe, Mobb Deep, and Illmatic, were able to do this.

See The Space Program,Shook Ones, and If I Ruled the World respectively.

Trap is not the Problem

One of the paragraphs made the claim that the “mumble rap” genre originated in Atlanta thanks to the likes of Migos and Future.

But it wasn’t what I said. What I was pointing was that everyone is copying the Future/Migos trap flow.

There are certainly good trap artists out there and they definitely don’t mumble either. For example, T.I., Gucci Mane, and Yo Gotti.

However they each have their unique style to their music.

On the other hand, you have Desiigner, Blac Youngsta, Young Thug, and Famous Dex who all rap the same. And not just in their use of triplets, but in their melody, delivery, and lyrics (if you even understand it) as well.

To Finish Off

He defends Yachty and Kodack as rappers that can actually rap and not mumble.

However going by the definition I gave, “lack of (or just outright incomprehensible) lyricism, excessive use of ad-libs, and lack of creativity outside of hedonistic content.” It’s hard to classify these guys as mumble rappers.

They’re clearly understandable, they don’t use many ad-libs at all, and they’ve shown to be creative in the content (e.g Better andDrowning ft Kodack Black respectively).

However a lot of the so-called “old heads” like to lump them with them. So it’s why I had to name drop Yachty and especially his ignorance of Pac and Biggie as a disregarded of older generation of rap in today’s music. (This may be why old heads call him a mumbler anyway)

Real mumble rappers like those already mentioned would be someone like Playboi Carti.

You could say Lil Uzi Vert too, especially because of songs like Money Longer and Safe House. However he seems to be showing a change in direction with some songs on his new album, namely XOTour Llif3 and The Way Life Goes.

He repeats again that hip-hop is becoming more diverse. But as I’ve said, it’s not like Lil Peep is the latest buzz.

He later goes on and uses a clip from Wu Tang Clan to defend “mumble rap.” It’s an appeal to authority and he doesn’t add anything to it.

Overall the article fails to address any my points and quite plainly, was a waste of my time to even respond to